There is a fair scattering of small clouds at the moment, and so I would say we are having sunny intervals rather than sunshine. From 1pm the forecast does change to sunny intervals, but even the latest revision to the forecast says it will be a dry day, and the temperature should reach 17° C - although not until very late in the afternoon. Tomorrow maybe a little more cloudy, and that will reduce the amount of sunny intervals - some hours may just be light grey, but it may still stay dry. The headline figure for tomorrow was 15° C, but it has now changed to 18° C, and yet the highest temperature shown on the hour by hour chart is 17° C.

  I think that I let "social isolation" get to me yesterday. I couldn't get it out of my mind that the current Angela situation, although probably always doomed, gives me no hope for the future. That was one factor that interfered with my day. One thing that sapped my enthusiasm for going out for a long walk was yet another bout of constipation. I definitely didn't "go" yesterday, and I am not sure if I went properly the day before. I should note that this morning everything seemed perfectly normal, although I suspect there is more to come.

  I did go out for a short walk yesterday, but only as far as Poundland. There were only 2 people in the queue when I got there, and I didn't have to wait long to go. That was fortunate because light rain started while I was waiting, and while I was in the store there was a torrential downpour. The rain was still a bit heavy when I left the store. Oddly enough there was no queue outside when I left. I can imagine that anyone who was waiting quickly dispersed to find shelter when the heavens opened !
  Walking to Poundland was just the right sort of difference to experiment with my footwear. I wore the boots shown above. I have had these boots for many years, and there is very little wear on them. I think that is because they seem to be uncomfortable. The last time I walked in them I was wearing long socks with quite strong elastic at the top. Since my quad heart bypass operation in 2013 my ankles and the bottom of my legs tend to swell, and that elastic top can really cut into my leg. I think that may have been a significant source of discomfort.

  These boots pre-date that operation, and tight elastic topped socks would not have been a problem then, but wearing thick socks, made for hiking, may have been a problem by making the boot feel too tight. Yesterday's experiment was to try thin trainer socks. I think they may have worked. At least I felt no discomfort for the short (6 minutes ?) walk to Poundland, and the same going home. However, after unloading my purchases in the kitchen, I then found my right (or was it left ?) foot suddenly seemed to be uncomfortable for no apparent reason. I'll have to try these boots, with the trainer socks, on a longer walk to see how they fare sometime.

  While I did very little yesterday, I didn't do nothing. There was the walk to Poundland for one thing, but I also did a few little jobs - including some very basic cooking. For lunch I treated myself to an emergency meal - a Princes "chicken balti pie" in the same sort of tin as the world famous (?) Fray Bentos "steak and kidney pie" in it's own pie dish. It was a pretty unhealthy meal, but I didn't care until I had finished it. I would have continued not to care if I had enjoyed it more. It was in that strange category of not nasty, but not really enjoyable. I must admit I didn't expect it to be that wonderful, but I did hope that it might have been better than it was. I replaced it with 2 Fray Bentos steak and kidney pies when I was in Poundland.

  One other little job I did deserves a mention because it revealed hidden treasure (well, sort of). I didn't really fancy spending much time in the back room (one day to be my dining room again) because it was rather chilly in there (although I suppose 18° C is not really that chilly). Nevertheless, I did spent 20 - 30 minutes doing a bit of tidying up down there. There is an open shelf in my drinks cabinet, and it had a load of clutter in it. I sorted through it, and chucked out a load of ancient paperwork. Among it I found one of those envelope type things that photos come in. There were no photos in it, but there was a set of negatives.
  Most of the negatives were of my old mate's band. It was the first gig I ever went to that I took my Practika Super TL SLR camera to. Most of those pictures look pretty fair considering I hadn't taken any snaps at a gig before. Also on the negatives were a picture of me and my old friend Jenny Leather taken in some unknown place. I cropped the picture to show just me, and it is on the left in the picture above.

  To the right is a picture taken just last night - wearing the same t-shirt ! I don't know when the photos were taken, but my guess would be that it was before I moved here in late 1983. It would have been a time when I had managed to lose a lot of weight - and I mean a lot ! Sadly the t-shirt is no longer big enough for me to wear without my gut hanging out at the bottom. I find it sort of curious that my face actually looks thinner now. It seems all the fat has gone into me chin !

  Well I am never going to lose weight if I have dinners that were worse than my lunch. Last night's dinner was a big chunk of very fatty smoked Polish bacon. I ate it with Italian inspired flavoured baked beans from Heinz "Creationz" series. I knew it was very bad for me, but I didn't care again. It just felt like a special occasion when rules have to be broken. The flaw was that like the chicken balti pie, I found I didn't enjoy it on the level I expected to. Maybe the flavour was being spoiled by guilt or something.

  I stayed watching TV a bit later than usual last night. There was a repeat of QI on that I hadn't seen before. When that finished I went to bed to read for a while. I think it was almost 11pm when I put the book down because I could feel my eyelids wanting to close. I turned out the light, and nothing happened. Suddenly I was not as sleep as I thought. A little while after midnight I got up again and made myself feel worse by looking at some pictures I had taken last year. There was my 5 mile walk from Shoeburyness to Southend, and my 3.75 mile walk from Southminster to Burnham On Crouch, plus other days out to "exotic" places. I cannot wait for that level of freedom again once the Covid-19 thing dies down.

  It was probably gone 1am when I finally fell asleep this morning. From then one my sleep was pretty normal, although I did get up about a hour later than usual. I knew the stuff I ate yesterday was not good for me, but I didn't think it had much sugar in it, but my blood glucose meter says otherwise. My blood glucose level hit he danger area this morning. I'm too scared to weigh myself, but at least my temperature is perfectly normal, as is my blood pressure.

  I think my plan for today is to try and (mostly) fast until dinner time, and for dinner to be very light, and perhaps almost all vegetables. That should get my blood glucose back on track. I need to supplement that with a long walk. I will see how it goes, but Ideally I would manage another 4 mile walk. I just wish I could walk a bit slower, and take an occasional short rest, but in these days of social isolation, and special rules, it feels like it is not proper exercise unless you keep going almost non stop, and as fast as you can. I guess that is better for me, but it can make a walk more of a task than something to enjoy.